various contributors

“ Trumpington was a mild amiable-looking man. There was not the faintest prospect of his flying into a rage. He would not say, "What right have you to interfere with the private affairs of another man's domesticated fauna?" He would not ask me why I had inveigled his beautiful black cat on to my poisonous premises. No, we should talk together reasonable, amicably, and as man to man. Mr. Trumpington would promise to do all he could to give his cat pleasant, cheerful evenings at home, and I should agree that it was very hard to prevent a young cat from wanting to see a bit of life. ”

“ For the most part the sun has been shining from a blue sky on a blue and brilliant sea; men, women and children have been swimming and splashing joyfully in a most mixed manner, and the whole landscape has had its usual holiday air. ”

“ I think I am a tenor, but after taking lessons continuously for six years from sixteen different masters I am still in doubt, and what is more, I am not quite certain whether I want to be. Did not somebody once say that a tenor was not a man but a disease? I am a healthy normal subject, and recently won the lawn-tennis singles at our local tournament. ”

“ Again, Russian railway porters are in the habit of shouting the names of stations, not only in a loud clear voice, but with scrupulously clear articulation. Do not rashly abandon your career on the railway on the off-chance of a vocal Bonanza. Remember the words of the poet:—
O, ever since the world began,
There never was and never can
Be such a very useful man
As the railway porter!
My voice is of good compass and volume, but it is lacking in the "rich fruity tone" which, according to popular novelists, is indispensable to the exertion of a magnetic influence on the hearer. ”

“ Trumpington, looking through the hollyhock peepholes, the buds of which rapidly began to turn from a lightish pink to deep rose.
It is always a more dignified policy to ignore a man in a temper, so it was not until about ten minutes had elapsed, and silence reigned, that I crawled painfully away into safety. ”

“ Pattie may improve so much with the constant practice that she will be able to return my service; in which case it will settle the game, for wherever we put the ball Wilbrooke is bound to get hold of it and drive or smash it so that we can't return it.
(2) I may serve Pattie a double-fault. But I am now in splendid training; my right biceps is like a cricket-ball, and I feel that I could serve all day without tiring. Besides, the quality of my service is improving, which counteracts, in a measure, the possible improvement in Pattie's game. ”

“ Warre Cornish has elected to arrange his views on religion, art, literature, politics and the questions of the day, sometimes putting them into the mouths of his characters and sometimes into the note-book of the afore-mentioned Henry Savile, a leisured cripple whose disquisitions on letters and on people are, if a trifle rambling, at any rate delightfully critical and much more interesting and profound than certain others which flow periodically from the windows of cloistered retreats. ”

“ As in the enervating luxury of peace, so in the stern stringency of war we have always a use, and a good use too, for the humourist. But he must be a jester of the right sort; not bitter nor flippant, not over boisterous nor too "intellectual." Humour for humour's sake is what we want, and in these anxious hours something to make us laugh quietly and unhysterically, if only by way of temporary relief. ”

“ Above the sea-weed an anemone sat fatly.
"I suppose they're all just as much alive as we are," she said thoughtfully. They marry"—I looked at my limpet with a new interest—and bring up families and go about their business, and it all means just as much to them as it does to us."
"My limpet's business affairs mean nothing to me," I said firmly. "I am only wrapped up in him as a sprinter."
"He's not quite ready yet. He still his suspicions."
Celia dropped into silence. Her next question showed that she had left the pool for a moment.
"Are there any people in Mars?" she asked. ”

“ Every August Bank Holiday we have a short Mixed Open Tournament at our lawn-tennis club. It's quite a small, homely affair, but as our President, Sir Benjamin Boogles, always offers two valuable prizes (hall-marked) , every member who can possibly enter does so. Each year hitherto the Tournament has been finished in the one day; but this year it is not finished yet—in fact, in one instance the first game of the first set is still undecided, and the winners in the other sets are anxiously awaiting the result in order that the second round may proceed before the end of the season. ”

“ Wilbrooke, our crack player, who can easily give most of us forty and a bonus of five games in the set, and still beat us, recently became engaged to Pattie Blobson, who is a hopeless rabbit at the game, this being her first season. Not unnaturally she insisted on his entering the Tournament with her. I always enter with Joan, and though we are neither of us exactly rabbits it would be rather hard to find a zoological term that would fittingly describe our standard of play. ”

“ High stand-up collars are certainly to be avoided, as they constrict the Adam's apple and muffle the tone of the voice. A soft turn-down collar, such as those supplied by Pope Bros., is greatly to be preferred and imparts a romantic and semi-Byronic appearance highly desirable in an artist.
I am a railway porter with a good bass voice, and having read that the great Russian singer who has been appearing at Drury Lane began life in that position and is now paid at the rate of £400 a night I am anxious to follow his example, if I can obtain adequate guarantees of success.—Clapham Junction. ”

“ It was Hans von Bülow who said that a tenor was a disease, but he was a pianist and a conductor. Do not "grouse" if you can sing tenor parts and yet retain the volume and virility of a baritone. Jean de Reszke began as a baritone and is said to have earned £20,000 a year. The nasal tone that you speak of, when it approximates to the whinnying of a horse or, better still, the trumpeting of an infuriated rogue elephant, is a most valuable asset, but should be used with moderation in the family circle. ”

“ Considering how they set themselves up to be superior and instruct, books are curiously grubby things.
And, as I said before, they should be in one volume.
THE PROBLEM OF LIFE.
The noise of the retreating sea came pleasantly to us from a distance. Celia was lying on her—I never know how to put this nicely—well, she was lying face downwards on a rock and gazing into a little pool which the tide had forgotten about and left behind. I sat beside her and annoyed a limpet. ”

“ Still there were left at liberty enough to maim cattle and shoot at landlords. If Germany had happened to step in at that epoch it would have been a perilous time for England. The House of Commons after many years' hesitation has offered to bestow Home Rule upon Ireland and this is Ireland's first articulate response. Her Nationalists range themselves with Ulster by the side of Great Britain threatened by a foreign foe."
Business done.—Foreign Secretary, amid prolonged cheers, announces that England means to stand by France in the coming war, and will fulfil her Treaty obligations to Belgium. ”

“ We have felt and are feeling the imminence of war, and, though our judgments are firm and patriotic and prepared for sacrifice, our minds are clouded with a heavy anxiety. Our newspapers arrive at about 11 o'clock, and at that hour there is a concentrated rush to the book-shop. ”

“ Even Frederick, the pious, as contrasted with the flippant, nephew of aunt Quilter—Frederick, with his futile institute for people who want none of it, his blind pedantry, and his actual dishonesty in what he considers a worthy cause—even he is punished no further than his actual deserving. ”

“ Hay, while alive to existing faults, loves everything and everybody. In return most people will be prepared to love him. And he deserves to be loved for the sake of a book which has a happy beginning, a happy middle and a happy end, together with lots of incidental laughter.
"There is a teacup storm in the Close, I hear. The Dean altered the time of closing the Minster for summer cleaning or some such trifle, and did not consult the Chapter, which had already made its holiday arrangements." ”

“ But as we placed them side by side we could almost hear them sigh after their separation—though whether with satisfaction or annoyance who shall say? Volumes, may be, can get as tired of their companions as human beings can. ”

“ Some time later I was rewarded by the sight of a black cat stealing with a look of grateful memory on its face towards the Trumpington back-door.
Customer. "But that's a fearful price for shrimp-paste."
Grocer. "Ah, but these are North Sea shrimps, Madam."
THE RESTORATIVE POWER OF MUSIC.
My house, though in the eyes of the rate-collector fully occupied, has now for several weeks stood with an unmistakably vacant stare. My cook alone, with a young lady friend for company, dwells there. What our great ballad-writers call the patter of tiny feet is stilled. ”

“ Titterton has the Du Maurier manner, but his jocular skittishness, aided by asterisks, exclamation marks and suspensive dots, has curiously little behind it. It is not enough to-day to paint the gay impropriety of models and the devil-may-care penury of lighthearted artists. ”

“ All books are the same to her in that they contain type on which the eye can fasten to the detriment of her labour. In every room I have stumbled over her long black legs as she thus abused her trust. ”

“ She rose to go.
"And if," said the station-master, showing her out, "if a train should arrive at 6.30 from London to-morrow and disgorge this husband of yours, won't you do us all a little kindness? Won't you make a point of telling the porter, all the porters, foreman porters, ticket collectors, inspectors, casual postmen and even myself? You have no idea what a change it would be for us to hear a lady saying, 'My husband ought to have come by this train, and he has!'"
FINANCIAL STRINGENCY AT THE SEASIDE: A GOOD PENNYWORTH.
Our Loyal Statuary. ”

“ A boy-scout called at the house and produced an official paper asking for the names and addresses of any aliens who might be residing in the house. We have one such alien, a German maid for the children, a most unwarlike and inoffensive alien. ”

“ Synopsis of Preceding Instalment:—Ralph Wonderson, the famous athlete, while on a mountaineering expedition in Switzerland, encounters Lady Margaret Tamerton, whom he has not seen since childhood. With her are her brother, Lord Tamerton; her cousin, Sir Ernest Scrivener; and three Swiss guides. They combine to make an ascent of the Wetterhorn under Ralph's leadership. Early in the climb Ralph discovers that Sir Ernest Scrivener is none other than his own mortal foe, Marmaduke Moorsdyke. A perilous traverse of a glacier has to be undertaken. ”